Palpatine’s palpitations: Did Ian McDiarmid (Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars) suffer a heart attack onstage and refuse to go to hospital in order to finish his performance?(The Times)

The Times‘ Caitlin Moran gets insider dish about Doctor Who from Russell T. Davies and a very fit-looking John Barrowman.

Kerry Katona has kept a lucrative ad contract with Iceland, a frozen food retailer, despite her trainwreck TV appearance. BBC NEWS reports, “The company said it had ‘first hand experience’ of the reality TV star slurring her words but said she had always been able to resume her work ‘after a short period.'”

Richard Branson will abandon his quest to break the record for fastest transatlantic crossing by boat. “We were doing very good until recently when we had a massive wave hit us from behind. It literally took one of our life craft with it. The storm has also taken out the spinnaker and ripped the main sail so we’ll have to decide whether it can be mended and whether we’ve still got a chance of making the record.”(Telegraph)

The Times‘ Pete Paphides gives two stars to The Cure‘s “disappointing” new album. “There isn’t a song on this, the Cure’s 13th album, that doesn’t sound like an inferior version of one they have already written – indeed, in the case of the 23-year-old ‘Sleep When I’m Dead,’ an actual version of one they have already written.”

Kevin Wicks

Kevin Wicks founded BBCAmerica.com's Anglophenia blog back in 2005 and has been translating British culture for an American audience ever since. While not British himself - he was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri - he once received inordinate hospitality in London for sharing the name of a dead but beloved EastEnders character. His Anglophilia stems from a high school love of Morrissey, whom he calls his "gateway drug" into British culture.

The Latest from Mind The Gap

America’s British population has taken to the web to voice its displeasure at news that U.S. candy giant Hershey has successfully blocked our much loved U.K.-produced chocolate from being exported to the land of the free.